Update
The Rising Cost of Trump’s Economy
10. 29. 2026
Tracking the data shows the affordability crisis has only gotten worse.
Nearly two years into a new Trump Administration, Americans are feeling more pocketbook pain than ever. The price of healthcare, already unaffordable for millions, keeps rising. Paychecks have lost purchasing power over the past year. Housing and childcare costs are forcing young adults to delay major life events like getting married and having kids, and for many, the idea of ever owning a home has been pushed out of reach entirely.
One year ago, our sister organization Economic Security Project released the Affordability Framework, putting broken markets and broken incomes at the center of the conversation about why life has become unaffordable and how people experience it. This year, ESP built on that framework with their Affordability Dashboard, a tool to track people’s lived experience of the economy through the key prices they pay, as well as a series of policy deep-dives into the essentials that shape families’ economic security, from housing to childcare.
Economic Security Project Action is tracking how broken markets and broken incomes are converging in real time to make life unaffordable for Americans, so that policymakers can focus their firepower on the right issues and the right solutions. Below are some key data points that show how Americans are experiencing the affordability crisis today:
Healthcare
Trump and Republicans cut $911 billion from federal Medicaid funding over the next decade and let the enhanced Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits that lower the cost of premiums expire, leaving families paying more for coverage and putting roughly 15 million people on track to become uninsured by 2034.
Millions have already dropped off public and Marketplace coverage, and more losses are coming.
- Individual ACA enrollment fell by 4.6 million people, or 18%, between June 2025 and June 2026 after enormous premium spikes, and nearly one in ten 2025 Marketplace enrollees now say they are uninsured, according to an October 2026 KFF analysis.
- Medicaid enrollment fell by 5.1 million from June 2025 to June 2026.
- The cost of a benchmark ACA plan for a 40-year-old jumped from $497 in 2025 to $625 a month in 2026. Marketplace enrollees are paying 58% more in premiums, with deductibles up 37%, according to KFF.
- Insurers are proposing a 15% median rate hike for ACA premiums in 2027, the second year in a row of double-digit spikes. This surge comes after a 20% median increase in 2026.
- Employers projected a 6.7% increase in employee health costs in 2026 and expected costs to rise by 8.2% in 2027, according to the National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans in August 2026.
Housing
Trump’s tariffs tax the materials used to build homes, making it more expensive to address the housing shortage.
- Rent for a new lease is now nearly $2,000 a month nationwide, with an increase of $81 a month from $1,851 in December 2024 to $1,932 in September 2026.
- Mortgage rates rose from 6.85% to 7.40%, comparing December 26, 2024 with October 15, 2026.
- Trump’s tariffs add an estimated $17,500 to the cost of building a home, according to an estimate from the Center for American Progress.
Energy and Transportation
Trump’s war in Iran has raised fuel costs, while his administration has canceled investments in energy and the electric grid.
- The price of gasoline rose 37.8%, from a national average of $3.10 a gallon on October 28, 2024, to $4.27 on October 26, 2026.
- The price of diesel rose 78% over the same period, from $3.57 to $6.35. Diesel moves the trucks that carry groceries and other goods, so higher fuel costs feed into what families pay at the store.
- Electricity prices rose 10.1% from September 2024 to September 2026, to an average of 19.6 cents per kilowatt-hour.
- Natural gas prices rose 21.5% over the same period, to $1.70 a therm.
Groceries
Trump’s tariffs tax imported food and household goods. Republicans also drastically cut SNAP, the nation’s largest food assistance program.
- Key kitchen table basics cost more. Coffee costs 37.7% more than in December 2024, reaching $9.33 a pound, and ground beef costs 21.2% more, reaching $6.79 a pound.
- About 5.5 million people have lost SNAP benefits that help them afford groceries, including likely 2 million children, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Childcare and Care at Home
The Trump Administration removed the federal cap on childcare copays, while Medicaid cuts threaten the help families need to care for aging relatives at home. Immigration enforcement has reduced immigrant women’s employment in child care centers, and restrictions on immigration threaten the supply of home care workers.